NBA Draft 2025: Projected Contracts For Cooper Flagg And Other First-Round Picks

Forbes Daily Briefing

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4.6 • 12 Ratings

🗓️ 28 June 2025

⏱️ 5 minutes

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Summary

Duke’s freshman phenom went No. 1 and can earn nearly $14 million next season—not including endorsements. It could be the beginning of a billion-dollar career for the 18-year-old.

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0:00.0	Here's your Forbes Daily Briefing for Saturday, June 28th. Today on Forbes, NBA Draft 2025,
0:09.6	projected contracts for Cooper Flag and other first-round picks. If there was any doubt that
0:15.8	Cooper Flag would be the first player selected in the 2025 NBA draft on Wednesday night,
0:22.1	it was dispelled within minutes of the event kicking off. Shortly after NBA Commissioner Adam Silver announced the 18-year-old
0:28.1	star from Newport, Maine, as the Dallas Mavericks selection at number one overall,
0:33.3	Flagg walked across the stage at Barclay Center in Brooklyn, exuding a quiet confidence that
0:38.1	suggested he was right where he belonged. After all, Flagg has had scouts hyperventilating over his
0:44.2	seemingly limitless talent for years, all through high school and across his lone season at Duke
0:49.7	University, where he won the Naismith National Player of the Year Award as a freshman, and led the Blue Devils to an ACC championship and a final four birth.
0:59.1	As the first pick in the draft, he will likely be guaranteed more than $60 million in salary over the first four years of his NBA career.
1:07.9	An if flag was been compared to past teen phenoms, LeBron James, and Victor
1:12.3	Wembeyanama, as a franchise-altering number one draft choice, fulfills that promise,
1:17.8	his rookie contract will look like a bargain. Based on the NBA's rookie salary scale,
1:23.5	Flagg can expect to earn almost $14 million in his first season of professional basketball,
1:28.3	a smidge below the $14.5 million average salary of the 354 players in the league already
1:35.3	signed for the 2025-26 season, according to Contract Database Spot Track.
1:41.3	The top pick in the draft is slotted for $11.5 million, but teams are allowed to surpass that
1:47.2	value by as much as 20%, or dip below it by the same percentage.
1:52.5	At least the last two top draft picks have come in above the slot value, Wembeanyama,
1:58.0	taken by the San Antonio Spurs in 2023, and Zachary Riesache, who joined the Atlanta Hawks in 2024,
2:05.7	after both played professionally in France.
2:08.4	Wembeñama, now 21 years old, pulled in $12.2 million in his rookie season, the first of a four-year
	...

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